Tax Day/Tea Party Day

Are you a fellow patriot?

That's how I was greeted today, upon arriving at my local area Tea Party. I answered "yes, I am". I knew that it was code she was using (are you one of us?), but well, why not use that to my advantage.
I do consider myself a patriot - I'm an honest patriot. I feel the way to be truly patriotic is to speak the truth about your nation.

Let me say that I completely understand how someone could be exasperated with their government. I understand the idea of being upset over unnecessary spending - I remember the stories of the $3,000 hammers and $500 toilet seats. I can understand being upset about huge deficits. What I'm trying to figure out about the Tea Party movement is: What exactly are they protesting? Higher taxes? The Bailouts? Huge borrowing? Pork Barrel Spending? or are they protesting the election of a Democrat to the White House?

On higher taxes, I guess they all must make a helluva lot more than I do. It seemed to me that only the highest tax bracket was going to get an increase and it was only about 3%. Or are they protesting the "possibility" of new taxes?

On the Bailouts, where were they last fall when the Bush administration was in charge of this?

On Deficit Spending, do they not remember Reagan? Do they not remember a hugely expensive war? Again, where have they been?

On Pork Barrel Spending, I saw many Democrats named - but where were the Republican names to go with them?
On Obama - The hosts of our local event, stated that this was not a partisan movement, but I fear they do not realize they have been co-opted.
Over the past 8 years, I have been called a traitor, un-American, an America-hater, a commie - you name it. All because I voiced my feelings about my country and my leaders. Now the same people that harassed and scorned people like me - are protesting a President that has been in power for less than 100 days. But it's not partisan.

I guess my biggest issue - is when "protecting" the Constitution is mentioned. George W. Bush and his cronies used the Constitution to wipe their asses for 8 years - where was the outrage then? No, these were the same people that would tell you "I have nothing to hide" when it came to warrant-less wiretapping - or would say "I don't care what you do to the terrorists" when confronted about torture. I don't understand how that can be reconciled.

Tax Day/Tea Party Day